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Abstract
This article approaches the debate on ‘contemporary land grabbing’ from a human rights perspective, focusing on one right that is particularly threatened: the right to food. It sketches an analytical framework grounded in international human rights law and the contribution such a framework can bring to the land-grabbing debate. Following a brief historical background on the right to food and its articulation in international human rights law, the paper expands on this by focusing on what can be called human rights responses to land grabbing from a right to food standpoint. The analysis considers the contributions of different actors in the human rights sphere and examines the role of the UN Committee on World Food Security and its recently adopted Voluntary Guidelines on the responsible governance of tenure of land, fisheries and forests. It also investigates how the phenomenon has been addressed by the UN human rights mechanisms, drawing on relevant practice of the UN treaty bodies and the Human Rights Council, with a focus on the Special Rapporteur on the right to food and the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Cambodia. The engagement of regional human rights system with the issue of large-scale land transactions is also analysed.
Notes
1 O De Schutter, ‘How not to think of land-grabbing: three critiques of large-scale investments in farmland’, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(2), 2011, p 249.
2 fian International, Land Grabbing in Kenya and Mozambique: A Report on Two Research Missions—and a Human Rights Analysis of Land Grabbing, Heidelberg: fian International, 2010, p 7.
3 S Narula, ‘The global land rush: markets, rights, and the politics of food’, paper presented at the ‘International Conference on Global Land Grabbing II’, Cornell University, 17–19 October 2012, p 23.
4 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter, UN Doc. A/HRC/13/33/Add.2, 28 December 2009, § 33.
5 See, for example, A Goetz, ‘Private governance and land grabbing: the equator principles and the Roundtable on Sustainable Biofuels’, Globalizations, 10(1), 2013, pp 199–204.
6 Narula, ‘The global land rush’, p 23.
7 Responses of civil society organisations to land grabbing are described in another article in this issue. See also R Künnemann & S Monsalve Suárez, ‘International human rights and governing land grabbing: a view from global civil society’, Globalizations, 10(1), 2013, pp 123–139; Brot für die Welt, icco & fian International, Land Grabbing and Nutrition: A Challenge for Global Governance, Right to Food and Nutrition Watch 2010, available at www.rtfn-watch.org.
8 See W Barth Eide & U Kracht (ed), Food and Human Rights in Development: Legal and Institutional Dimensions and Selected Topics, Antwerp: Intersentia, 2005; and J Ziegler, C Golay, C Mahon & S-A Way, The Fight for the Right to Food: Lessons Learned, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
9 C Golay, The Right to Food and Access to Justice: Examples at the National, Regional and International Levels, Rome: fao, 2009.
10 These were adopted by the UN General Assembly on 10 December 1948, Resolution 217 A (III); and on 16 December 1966, Resolution 2200 A (XXI) (entering into force on 3 January 1976), respectively.
11 Emphasis added.
12 fao, Rome Declaration on World Food Security (13–17 November 1996), § 1; and World Food Summit Plan of Action, 1996, Goal 7.4, § 6.1.
13 cescr, General Comment 12: The Right to Adequate Food, UN Doc. E/C.12/1999/5, 12 May 1999.
14 The mandate was created by resolution 2000/10 of the Commission on Human Rights. See websites of the mandate holders at www.righttofood.org and www.srfood.org.
15 fao, Declaration of the World Food Summit: Five Years Later, Rome: fao, § 10.
16 See fao, Right to Food: Making it Happen—Progress and Lessons Learned through Implementation, Rome: fao, 2011. See also www.fao.org/righttofood.
17 The speech is available at http://www.un.org/apps/news/infocus/sgspeeches/search_full.asp?statID=413.
18 The Protocol of San Salvador was adopted on 17 November 1988 by the General Assembly of the Organization of American States. See Articles 12, 15 and 17. Aside from the right to education and the right to organise and join unions, the rights recognised in the Protocol of San Salvador cannot be adjudicated before the Inter-American Commission or Court on Human Rights. See Article 19(6).
19 Golay, The Right to Food and Access to Justice, pp 37–46.
20 See L Knuth & M Vidar, Constitutional and Legal Protection of the Right to Food around the World, Rome: fao, 2011; and Golay, The Right to Food and Access to Justice, pp 47–58.
21 cescr, General Comment 12, § 6. This definition was clearly inspired by the definition of food security adopted by states in the 1996 wfs Plan of Action. fao, World Food Summit Plan of Action, 1996, § 1.
22 cescr, General Comment 12, §§ 6–8.
23 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Jean Ziegler, UN Doc. A/HRC/7/5, 10 January 2008, § 18. Right to Food Guidelines, 1.1 provides that states should create the conditions ‘in which individuals can feed themselves and their families in freedom and dignity’.
24 See Right to Food Guidelines, 8, 13, 14.
25 Commission on Human Rights, The Right to Adequate Food and to be Free from Hunger: Updated Study on the Right to Food, Submitted by A Eide, UN Doc. E/CN.4/Sub.2/1999/12, 28 June 1999.
26 See cescr, General Comment 12, § 15; and Preface and Introduction to the Right to Food Guidelines, § 17.
27 Ziegler et al, The Fight for the Right to Food, pp 18–22.
28 O De Schutter, Countries Tackling Hunger with a Right to Food Approach, Briefing Note 1, Special Rapporteur on the right to food, 2010; and fao, Right to Food: Making it Happen—Progress and Lessons Learned through Implementation, Rome: fao, 2011, pp 6–7.
29 C Golay & M Büschi, The Right to Food and Global Strategic Frameworks: The Global Strategic Framework for Food Security and Nutrition (gsf) and the UN Comprehensive Framework for Action (cfa), Rome: fao, 2012, pp 13–17.
30 On the different roles played by states in dealing with lslts, see W Wolford, SM Borras Jr, R Hall, I Scoones & B White, ‘Governing global land deals: the role of the state in the rush for land’, Development and Change, 44(2), 2013, pp 189–210.
31 cescr, General Comment 12, § 13.
32 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Jean Ziegler, UN Doc. A/57/356, 27 August 2002, §§ 22–42; and Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter, UN Doc. A/65/281, 11 August 2011.
33 It is estimated that 50% of the world’s hungry are smallholder farmers, 20% landless people and 10% herders, pastoralists or fisherfolk. UN Millenium Project, Task Force on Hunger, Halving Hunger: It can be Done—Summary Version, New York: UN Development Programme, 2005, pp 4–6.
34 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter, UN Doc. A/65/281, 11 August 2011, §§ 39–43. See also O De Schutter, ‘The emerging human right to land’, International Community Law Review, 12, 2010, pp 303–334. This reference to the commons can be seen as part of a broader societal recognition of common property resources. See K Milun, The Political Uncommons, Farham: Ashgate, 2011.
35 See Articles 14(2) and 16 of cedaw.
36 The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 13 September 2007, Resolution 61/295.
37 See, in particular, Articles 13–19 of the ilo Convention No 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples; and Articles 8, 10 and 26 of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
38 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter on his mission to China, UN Doc. A/HRC/19/59/Add.1, 20 January 2012; Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter on his mission to Mexico, UN Doc. A/HRC/19/59/Add.2, 17 January 2012; Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter on his mission to South Africa, UN Doc. A/HRC/19/59/Add.3, 13 January 2012; and Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter on his mission to Madagascar, UN Doc. A/HRC/19/59/Add.4, 26 December 2011.
39 Right to Food Guidelines, 8.
40 Ibid, 2.5.
41 Ibid, 8.1, 8.6.
42 P Clays & G Vanloqueren, ‘The minimum human rights principles applicable to large-scale land acquisitions or leases’, Globalizations, 10(1), 2013, p 193.
43 On the mandates and working methods of the special procedures, see C Golay, C Mahon & I Cismas, ‘The impact of the UN special procedures on the development and implementation of economic, social and cultural rights’, International Journal of Human Rights, 15(2), 2011, pp 299–318; S Subedi, S Wheatley, A Mukherjee & S Ngane, ‘The role of the special rapporteurs of the United Nations Human Rights Council in the development and promotion of international human rights norms’, International Journal of Human Rights, 15(2), 2011, pp 155–161; T Piccone, Catalysts for Change: How the UN’s Independent Experts Promote Human Rights, Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2012; and I Nifosi, The UN Special Procedures in the Field of Human Rights, Antwerp: Intersentia, 2005.
44 The Advisory Committee of the Human Rights Council is composed of 18 independent human rights experts. It was created on the basis of UN General Assembly Resolution 60/251 creating the Human Rights Council, adopted on 15 March 2006.
45 See report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Jean Ziegler, UN Doc. A/57/356, 27 August 2002, §§ 22-42; and the report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter, UN Doc. A/65/281, 11 August 2011.
46 See annex to the report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter on large-scale land acquisitions and leases: a set of minimum principles and measures to address the human rights challenge, UN Doc. A/HRC/13/33/Add.2, 28 December 2009.
47 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter on large-scale land acquisitions and leases, § 5.
48 Ibid, Summary, p 1.
49 Ibid, § 15.
50 These include situations in which labour issues are central. See TM Li, ‘Centering labor in the land grab debate’, Journal of Peasant Studies, 32(8), 2011, pp 281–298.
51 Annex to the report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food Mr Olivier De Schutter on large-scale land acquisitions and leases.
52 Resolution of the Human Rights Council on the right to food, UN Doc. A/HRC/RES/13/4, 24 March 2010, § 35.
53 Clays & Vanloqueren, ‘The minimum human rights principles applicable to large-scale land acquisitions or leases’, p 196.
54 Ibid, pp 196–197; O De Schutter, ‘The green rush: the global race for farmland and the rights of land users’, Harvard International Law Journal, 52(2), 2011, pp 504–559; and De Schutter, ‘How not to think of land-grabbing’.
55 The symposium ‘Business and Human Rights: Clearing the Path to Foster Corporate Accountability’ took place on 18 October 2010 in Geneva. More information is available at http://www.reports-and-materials.org/Land-grabbing-symposium-Geneva-18-Oct-2010.pdf.
57 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Cambodia Surya Subedi, UN Doc. A/HRC/21/63/Add.1, 24 September 2012.
58 Ibid, § 11.
59 Ibid, §168.
60 Ibid, § 120.
61 Ibid, § 163.
62 Ibid, § 154.
63 Ibid, § 172.
64 Ibid, § 226.
65 Ibid, § 207.
66 Resolution of the Human Rights Council on the right to food, UN Doc. A/HRC/RES/13/4, 14 April 2010, § 44. See also M Edelman & C James, ‘Peasants’ rights and the UN system: quixotic struggle? Or emancipatory idea whose time has come?’, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(1), 2011, pp 81–108.
67 Final study of the Human Rights Council Advisory Committee on the advancement of the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas, UN Doc. A/HRC/19/75, 24 February 2012.
68 Ibid, § 63.
69 Ibid, §§ 63, 74.
70 See S Monsalve Suarez, ‘The human rights framework in contemporary agrarian struggles’, Journal of Peasant Studies, 2012, pp 1–52; and E Holt Gimenez & A Shattuck, ‘Food crises, food regimes and food movements: rumblings of reform or tides of transformation? ’, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(1), 2011, pp 109–144.
71 Resolution of the Human Rights Council on the promotion and protection of the human rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas, UN Doc. A/HRC/RES/21/19, 11 October 2012, § 1.
73 H Keller & G Ulfstein (eds), UN Human Rights Treaty Bodies: Law and Legitimacy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012; M Cherif Bassiouni & WA Schabas (eds), New Challenges for the UN Human Rights Machinery: What Future for the UN Treaty Body System and the Human Rights Council Procedures?, Cambridge: Intersentia, 2011, pp 137–148, 192–173; and W Vandehole, The Procedures Before the UN Human Rights Bodies: Divergence or Convergence?, Antwerp: Intersentia, 2004.
74 cedaw, Concluding Observations: Togo, UN Doc. CEDAW/C/TGO/CO/6-7, 18 October 2012, § 37(e).
75 cedaw, Concluding Observations: Ethiopia, UN Doc. CEDAW/C/ETH/CO/6-7, 27 July 2011, § 36.
76 cescr, Concluding Observations: India, UN Doc. E/C.12/IND/CO/5, § 31.
77 cescr, Concluding Observations: Madagascar, UN Doc. E/C.12/MDG/CO/2, 16 December 2009, §§ 12, 33.
78 Ibid, § 12.
79 Ibid, § 12.
80 cescr, Concluding Observations: Cambodia, UN Doc. E/C.12/KHM/CO/1, 12 June 2009, § 30, emphasis added.
81 Ibid.
82 Ibid.
83 Ibid, § 16.
84 cescr, Concluding Observations: Democratic Republic of Congo, UN Doc. E/C.12/COD/CO/4, 20 November 2009, § 14.
85 cescr, Concluding Observations: Chad, UN Doc. E/C.12/TCD/CO/3, 16 December 2009 § 13; and cescr, Concluding Observations: Mexico, UN Doc. E/C.12/MEX/CO/4, 9 June 2006, § 28.
86 Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (cerd), Concluding Observations: Indonesia, UN Doc. CERD/C/IDN/CO/3, 15 August 2007, §§ 17.
87 Ibid.
88 cerd, Concluding Observations: Democratic Republic of Congo, UN Doc. E/C.12/COD/CO/4, 20 November 2009, § 14.
89 cerd, Concluding Observations: Lao PDR, UN Doc. CERD/C/LAO/CO/16-18, 9 March 2012, § 16–17.
90 Ibid, § 16.
91 cerd, Concluding Observations: Viet Nam, UN Doc. CERD/C/VNM/CO/10-14, 9 March 2012, § 15; cerd, Concluding Observations: Suriname, UN Doc. CERD /C /S U R /C O/12,3, 13 March 2009, §§ 12, 13, 14; cerd, Concluding Observations: Peru, UN Doc. CERD/C/PER/CO/14-17, 3 September 2009, § 21, 13 March 2010 ; and CERD, Concluding Observations: Colombia, UN Doc. CERD/C/COL/CO/14, 28 August 2009, § 19.
92 cerd, Concluding Observations: Cambodia, UN Doc. CERD/C/KHM/CO/8-13, 1 April 2010, § 16.
93 Ibid.
94 Ibid.
95 Ibid.
96 cedaw, Concluding Observations: Cambodia, UN Doc. CEDAW/C/KHM/CO/3, 25 January 2006, § 31.
97 Committee on the Rights of the Child (crc), Concluding Observations: Cambodia, UN Doc. CRC/C/KHM/CO/2, 20 June 2011, §§ 61, 61.
98 Ibid.
99 Ibid, referring to reports A/HRC/4/36 and A/HRC/7/42, cited above.
100 cerd, Concluding Observations: Cambodia, UN Doc. CERD/C/KHM/CO/8-13, 1 April 2010, § 16.
101 cedaw, Concluding Observations: Lao People’s Democratic Republic, UN Doc. CEDAW/C/LAO/CO/7, 14 August 2009, § 44, 45.
102 Künnemann & Monsalve Suárez, ‘International human rights and governing land grabbing’, p 127.
103 Ibid.
104 cescr, Concluding Observations: Germany, UN Doc. E/C.12/DEU/CO/5, 12 July 2011, § 11.
105 At the time of writing, six treaty monitoring bodies established within the UN human rights system can receive communications: cedaw, cerd, cescr, the Human Rights Committee, the Committee against Torture and the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
106 Golay, The Right to Food and Access to Justice, pp 32–33.
107 See, for example, Human Rights Committee, Ángela Poma Poma v Peru, Comm No 1457/2006, Views of 27 March 2009, UN Doc. CCPR/C/95/D/1457/2006; and Apirana Mahuika et al v New Zealand, Comm No 547/1993, Views of 27 October 2000, UN Doc. CCPR/C/70/D/541/1993. See also C Golay & M Ozden, The Right of Peoples to Self-determination, Geneva: cetim, 2009, p 55.
108 See I Biglino & C Golay, The Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, Geneva Academy In-Brief No 2, Geneva: Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights, 2013.
109 fao, Reform of the Committee on World Food Security, Final version, Thirty-fifth Session of CFS, 14, 15 and 17 October 2009, fao Doc. CFS:2009/2 Rev.2.
110 Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security, adopted by the fao Committee on World Food Security on 11 May 2012.
111 See P Seufert, ‘The fao Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests’, Globalizations, 10(1), pp 181–186; and S Monsalve Suarez, Land: Not for Sale!, Right to Food and Nutrition Watch, 2010, pp 33–37, available at www.rtfn-watch.org.
112 See Golay, The Right to Food and Access to Justice, pp 44–45.
113 Inter-American Court of Human Rights (iachr), Mayagna (Sumo) Awas Tingni Community v Nicaragua, 31 August 2001, §§ 153, 164, 173.4.
114 iachr, Saramaka v Suriname, 28 November 2007. The ‘Saramaka people’, are one of the six Maroon groups in Suriname whose ancestors were African slaves (§ 80). The Court reaffirmed that, similarly to indigenous communities, ‘the members of the Saramaka people make up a tribal community whose social, cultural and economic characteristics are different from other sections of the national community, particularly because of their special relationship with their ancestral territories, and…their own norms, customs, and/or traditions’ (§84).
115 Ibid, § 59.
116 Ibid, § 128
117 iachr, Kichwa Indigenous People of Sarayaku v Ecuador, 27 June 2012.
118 Ibid, §§ 100, 134.
119 Ibid, § 174.
120 Ibid, § 341. The relevant rights are in Articles 4(1) and 5(1) of the American Convention on Human Rights.
121 Respectively, Articles 14, 22, and 21 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.
122 African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, Centre for Minority Rights Development (Kenya) and Minority Rights Group International on behalf of Endorois Welfare Council v Kenya, 4 February 2010, §§ 286, 288.
123 Ibid.
124 The 10 countries that have ratified the Optional Protocol as of 1 August 2013 are Argentina, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mongolia, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain and Uruguay. Thirty-two more countries have signed but not yet ratifiied the Optional Protocol. See Biglino & Golay, The Optional Protocol, 2013.
125 In addition to Olivier De Schutter’s and Sofia Monsalve Suarez’s publications cited above, see L Cotula, ‘“Land grabbing” in the shadow of the law: legal frameworks regulating the global land rush’, in R Rayfuse & N Weisfelt (eds), The Challenge of Food Security: International Policy and Regulatory Frameworks, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2012, pp 206–228; and Cotula (ed), The Right to Food and Access to Natural Resources: Using Human Rights Arguments and Mechanisms to Improve Resource Access for the Rural Poor, Rome: fao, 2009.